Realogy soars on the HW 30 equity index

Realogy Holding Corp (RLGY) finished as the top performer on the HW 30 — HousingWire’s exclusive list of mortgage-related stocks — Monday as the company reported net revenue of $1.55 billion, up 21% year-over-year.

The company’s 29% increase in year-over-year homesale transaction volume exceeded the 26% sales volume increased reported by the National Association of Realtors.

“While industry observers anticipated that the mortgage rate environment would slow the housing recovery, we now believe the exact opposite occurred — it accelerated,” explained Realogy chairman, CEO and president Richard Smith.

He added, “In our view, the strong volume increase was driven by a combination of pent-up demand, relatively low inventory and a shift in homebuyer preference to purchase existing homes over new homes due to the ability to lock in mortgage rates for the shorter period it takes to close on an existing home purchase over a new home."

Realogy Holdings posted impressive results Monday, up more than 7% at the close of the day, or $43.8 a stock.

In the fourth quarter, the company expects year-over-year homesale transaction volume growth to continue, although, at a comparatively slower pace than last year’s growth, which was influenced by the change in capital gain taxes, stated Realogy executive vice president, CFO and treasurer Anthony Hull.

“Looking ahead, we expect full-year 2013 homesale transaction volume to increase 17% to 19% compared to 2012, resulting in annual Adjusted EBITDA for 2013 in the range of $785 to $800 million, an increase of 16% to 19% year-over-year,” Hull said.

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Christina Mlynski is a Reporter at HousingWire. She graduated with a bachelor's degree in news/editorial journalism from the University of North Texas, and previously worked for publications such as the Dallas Business Journal and Dallas Observer.

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